


get good again

by saltsanford



Category: Red vs. Blue
Genre: Fluff, Healing, M/M, Non-Explicit Sex, Original Character(s), Pole Dancing, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, background sargegrey, implied grimmons, tuckington isn't really the focus of this fic but it's certainly there and important
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-01
Updated: 2019-05-01
Packaged: 2020-02-10 16:06:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,120
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18663727
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/saltsanford/pseuds/saltsanford
Summary: How to allow yourself to be something else, after the war.





	get good again

**Author's Note:**

> me, firmly telling myself that i have no time to write a canon-divergent post season 13 longfic: look what if instead we write some self-indulgent nonsense featuring wash and pole dancing agaIN  
> me @ me: shit sis sounds like a good start
> 
> this is a direct sequel to [laughter lines](https://archiveofourown.org/works/11215413) & is in the pmgitg-verse. there’s a bunch of OCs in here and it probably isn’t going to make a lot of sense or mean much if you haven’t read [pmgitg](https://archiveofourown.org/works/6734932/chapters/15393220), esp the ending DID I MENTION THIS IS SELF-INDULGENT AF

_But don't you worry, you'll soon be on the mend_  
_And that's no trick, that flicker of radiance_  
_And you'll feel lucky, darling, I promise you this_  
_We'll figure it out and get good again._  
-Get Good, Vanessa Carlton

* * *

 

If he were being honest with himself, Wash had expected the whole thing to be a lot more dramatic.  
  
He’d thought about telling Tucker his real name— _birth name,_ he corrects himself, David’s not his real name anymore—several times over the years. Some days it seemed inconsequential, a mere blip in his history that his partner happened to not know. There were lots of things Tucker still didn’t know about him, after all, things that they were still learning about each other.  
  
Other days, however, it seemed absurd that Tucker didn’t know his name. Particularly as of late, when he’d been calling Tucker _Lavernius_ or _Vern_ more and more frequently. There’d been something about the way Tucker’s jaw had gone all tight and his eyes had gone all soft when he’d told Wash recently that he was named for his mother, Lavernia. That was important. Tucker’s name _meant_ something to him.  
  
Regardless of if David wasn’t his anymore, names were still important.  
  
Wash had thought it might be easier if he wrote his name down on a piece of paper and handed it to Tucker. He’d made the mistake of mentioning this to Donut during wine and cheese night, and rapidly regretted it when the evening instantly turned into wine and calligraphy practice night. “You could leave it under his pillow,” Donut had gushed, “or perhaps tuck it into his bagged lunch before he leaves for work—”  
  
“I don’t make Tucker a bagged lunch when he leaves for work, Donut—“  
  
“Does that mean he makes lunch for _you?_ ” Donut had asked swiftly, and Wash’s face turned bright red and he had to live with the entire security force making kissy noises for the next week every time he pulled out his lunch.  
  
Maybe he’d tell Tucker over dinner, he thought after that. Or as they lay in bed at night. Whenever it was, Wash knew the moment had to be quiet. It had to be right. It had to be just the two of them, when he’d told Tucker about _David Tobias Fletcher._  
  
But instead—  
  
Instead he’d give Tucker his name at a _dance club,_ of all things, on a perfect, glorious night when he’d danced and felt something unlock inside of him. He hadn’t even really thought about it before the words were out of his mouth, before Tucker had looked at him wide-eyed. It was perfect. The whole night was perfect. And...  
  
_Dancing._  
  
Ever since that night, he’s been thinking nonstop about how it felt to dance again. He spends an entire workday choreographing a routine in his head. He grins a little every time he passes Sabine’s club, thinks about how good it felt to remember that old muscle memory. He thinks about it while eating breakfast, while on his lunch break, while mowing the lawn and standing in the shower.  
  
And he’s thinking about it when he comes home one night to see a pole mounted right in the middle of their living room, with Tucker lying naked on a bearskin rug off to the side of it, blowing bubbles and giving Wash his best _fuck-me_ eyes.  
  
“Welcome home, baby,” he says, blowing more bubbles in Wash’s direction.   
  
Wash gapes at the sight, glancing between Tucker and the pole so quickly that he suspects he looks like a cartoon character. “What...how...”  
  
“Ah ah,” Tucker admonishes, as Wash reaches for him. “No touching. You have to earn it.”  
  
“Earn it?”  
  
“Mmmm-hmm.” Tucker sits up, jerking his head towards the pole as he presses play on his datapad. Something unspeakably obscene begins blasting from the speakers. “You gotta dance for me.”  
  
Wash does. Two hours later, after they’ve both come twice, knocked the couch over, broken a lamp, and gotten some pretty serious pole burn, they collapse onto the bear skin rug.   
  
It’s a while before Wash can speak, before he floats back down to reality. He watches Tucker, who is laying with his head on Wash’s chest, body stretched out perpendicular as he hums softly, blowing bubbles at the ceiling. “Bubbles?” Wash finally croaks.  
  
Tucker cranes his head to look at him, grinning. “They’re sexy.”  
  
Wash can only shake his head. After all, Tucker has declared far stranger things to be sexy over the year—loofahs, spatulas, a plastic yellow rain jacket—so this shouldn’t come as a surprise. He decides not to even ask about the bearskin rug, and instead lets his gaze drift to the pole. “You didn’t—“  
  
He cuts himself off before he can finish that sentence, the _have to_ lingering on his tongue. Tucker’s eyes narrow suspiciously, and Wash glances at the pole once more. “Thanks,” he says instead, voice choked with an embarrassing amount of emotion. “Thanks, Vern.”  
  
Tucker caps the bubbles, rolling over to kiss Wash soundly on the mouth. “Dance for me?” he says again, but he asks it differently this time. He _means_ it differently this time. “Please?”  
  
Wash slowly rises, pulling on his boxer briefs and running his fingertips gently over the stainless steel of the pole. It’s perfect. He ducks his head, grinning, as the soft notes of a classical piano number drift out from the speakers of Tucker’s datapad, so different from the filthy playlist that was playing earlier. Wash loses himself then, but not the way he’s lost himself so many times—in the dark, with boxes of memories scattered on the floor, jagged holes ripped clean through his mind. It’s a far better kind of losing himself— in the raindrop sounds of the piano, in the stretch of his muscles as his dances, in the warm-blanket brown of Tucker’s eyes.

* * *

  
Having the pole changes something in him. Changes him _deep,_ the way that yellow spray paint and birthday cake in a forgotten base changed him, the way that Carolina being alive had changed him, the way that Chorus and its people had changed him. Those things had given him a family, a miracle, something to believe in and fight for. They’d given him a future.  
  
The pole—  
  
The pole gives him back a piece of his past.  
  
He waits until Tucker is gone to try to dance again, feeling ridiculous and cold clad in nothing but the new compression shorts he’d bought. Somehow, this is far more difficult than dancing in front of Tucker had been—more difficult, even, than dancing in front of a club full of people had been. There’d been no time to be nervous, no time to think. Both times, he’d been moving on pure instinct and muscle memory, letting the music sweep him away, letting the eyes of the viewers be his anchor.  
  
There is no anchor now. There is only Wash and a pole, in a sun-soaked living room painted robin’s egg blue.  
  
Wash runs his hands down his body, feeling self-conscious and a little embarrassed. He’d been half-naked in front of what felt like a quarter of the planet the other night, and it only now occurs to him that they’d seen all of his scars.   
  
_Dude, trust me, no one was looking at your scars._  
  
He hears Tucker’s voice so clearly in his mind, knows with such certainty that’s what Tucker would say, that he actually turns towards the door, thinking Tucker is standing there. Wash is still alone, but a smile tugs at his lips, and he gives himself a little shake, stepping forward to wrap his fingers gently around the pole.  
  
Things are okay, after that. They’re _better_ than okay. He finally gets the idea to put some music on and drifts away inside the sound, flowing through moves he used to know, trying new ones he finds online. It’s been years, _years_ since he worked out like this, without a grim goal in mind, without a set of hauntingly high stakes hanging over his head. _You must be stronger than this, to carry Caboose off the battlefield. You must be faster than this, to take a bullet for Tucker. You must be braver than this, to follow Carolina into that building._  
  
But this—  
  
This feels like coming home, in a way he hadn’t even realized he’d wanted.  
  
Like being David again, in a way that doesn’t make him want to die— _Fletch,_ he remembers suddenly, clear as a bell. His friends in Basic had called him Fletch.   
  
The pole—the pole is a symbol, a piece of his old life that’s far more important that the name David, that can belong to him again, and for the first time, that doesn’t terrify him. He can’t go by his old name, can’t even entertain the thought of looking for his sisters, but he can dance. He can let himself have this.

So in the end, the way the pole changes him isn’t really surprising.  
  
What does surprise him is the way the pole changes other people, too.

* * *

  
It starts one rainy afternoon with a knock on the door.  
  
Wash still jerks whenever this happens, hand moving instinctively towards wherever he has a weapon hidden. He catches himself quickly this time, snatching his fingers back and glancing instead towards the datapad they have mounted on the wall, the one that gives a clear view into their front yard. Sarge had installed it for them without a word when Wash shot a hole through the front door the first time there’d been a knock on it and missed the postman by mere inches.  
  
Donut had taken to visiting every single day after that, with loud, cheerful knocks on the door. Judging by the number of other visitors they had, Wash suspected he’d told others to do the same, in a well-meaning attempt to reacclimate Wash and Tucker to civilian life.  
  
“You have neighbors now, Wash!” Donut had said brightly when Wash voiced his suspicions. “You’re going to have _visitors!_ You have to learn that every knock on the door isn’t a gunshot!”  
  
And, slowly, Wash had.  
  
But that doesn’t help him to mask his surprise at who’s standing at his front door now.  
  
Kimball is shaking off her umbrella when he answers, smiling at him a bit stiffly. “Hi,” Wash says awkwardly. “Uh, Tucker isn’t here—”  
  
“I’m not here to see Tucker,” says Kimball. She folds her umbrella up neatly and places it on the porch. “I’m here to see you.”  
  
Wash folds his arms across his chest, scowling. “Look, if this is about the problem with the new guard the other day, I already filed an incident report and the guy’s an idiot. He should never have been hired, you know—”  
  
“Not my job anymore,” Kimball reminds him, pretending to cover her ears. She drops them, eyeing him. “Maybe it shouldn’t be yours, either.”  
  
Wash ignores this, choosing instead to listen to the imaginary Donut lamenting Wash’s poor manners. “Uh...come in?”  
  
It comes out like a question but she gracefully ignores this, stepping instead and hanging up her raincoat. She takes longer than necessary to adjust it before turning around, looking Wash square in the eyes. “You asked me once if I had a thing. Do you remember?”  
  
Wash does. Back in the war, after that awful week that Britton had lost her arm and one of the Feds had taken a shot at Kimball with full intent to kill. She’d told him that Britton spoke five languages, that Martinez played the guitar, but Kimball hadn’t been able to tell him one thing about herself.  
  
Not one.  
  
“She likes fantasy books,” Tucker had told him once, somewhat defensively when he’d come home with a beautiful bond book of fairy tales to wrap for Kimball’s birthday. “ _Lord of the Rings_ and shit like that.”  
  
Wash hadn’t even known it was her birthday—he still manages to forget every single year— and staring at her now in his doorway, he realizes that this woman he’s known for five years, the woman who’s been living with his best friend, the woman he spent years fighting for, the woman he took a bullet for shortly after she became president—  
  
He doesn’t actually know her at all.  
  
Kimball begins speaking, clearly thinking he isn’t going to answer. “It was after that week—”  
  
“I remember,” Wash says quickly. “You said you didn’t have one. A thing.”  
  
She laughs a little. “I still feel like I don’t, most days.”  
  
“Tucker says you like to read.”  
  
“I do,” she says, surprised. “That’s right, you must have seen those books he bought me.”  
  
“I’m sorry—I’m not good with birthdays—”  
  
“Not the point,” Kimball says, waving a hand. “The point is—going dancing last week was the first time I’ve done something for myself in...in a very long time.”  
  
Wash’s smile is genuine, a wave of fondness swelling in his chest. “You deserve it.”  
  
She fidgets in a very un-Kimball-like manner, glancing towards the pole in the living room. “And _you_ looked amazing on that pole.”  
  
“Oh, uh...thanks.”  
  
The silence stretches on. “Did you mean it?” She asks finally. “When you said you’d teach me?”  
  
It finally clicks—why Kimball’s here, why she’s bringing up a conversation they had five years ago, why she looks so self-conscious. “Yes!” Wash says, so enthusiastically that she brightens at once. “Of course! You—” he glances between her and the pole. “You want _this_ to be your thing.”  
  
“Like I said, I’ve...well. I’ve always wanted to learn to dance.”  
  
She looks startled when Wash takes her by the hand and leads her into the living room, the same ease that had gripped him in the club propelling him forward now. “Well, today is the day you start.”  
  
Kimball has come prepared with bathing suit bottoms and her black hair up in a bun, and from the moment she touches the pole Wash can’t stop grinning. She’s a wonder, strong and fearless and undaunted by the challenge. Kimball puts on music and Wash helps her choreograph a small routine; she finds pictures of complicated looking pictures online and asks if Wash is able to do them. He tries, sometimes succeeding, sometimes failing and stumbling off the pole. They try a simple doubles move and end up in a tangle on the floor, laughing so hard they’re soon snorting.

Whatever worries Wash may have had about any potential awkwardness vanish within thirty seconds. Despite their mutual respect for each other, despite the fact that they’ve saved each other’s lives and see each other multiple times a week, there had always been a stiffness between their words, an awkwardness they couldn’t seem to shake. Wash thinks that Kimball never entirely learned to trust him, that she knew that Wash would always save his own first, just like Kimball would always save her own. But it had been years, now, that their own had mixed together. They had been allies, co-workers, they had been on each other’s team in firefights and beach volleyball matches alike, but they had never been friends.

But this—laughing through a dance lesson with Kimball, playing music and recording each other doing moves, ordering a pizza and eating it sitting on the counter—this is right, this is fun, this is—easy.

And it’s easy, too, when Tucker comes home and drops his keys on the floor, gaping at them, for Wash to turn and motion him over, because Vanessa ordered a pizza and is about to single-handedly house the whole thing if he doesn’t hurry—

Easy when Vanessa nearly shoves him off the counter and they laugh once more.

 _Friends,_ Wash thinks, looking at her bright smile. _Friends._

* * *

 

But it doesn’t stop with Vanessa, who comes back once a week after that. Wash isn’t surprised when Carolina drops by one afternoon to work out and play around on the pole—it’s hardly unusual for Carolina to come over and besides, the pole dancing thing was hardly news to her.

What does surprise him is when he opens the door one to see Sarge standing on his doorstep, clad in nothing but a tight t-shirt and bright red spandex shorts.

“Um,” says Wash, as Tucker’s spoon clatters into his cereal bowl.

“Thought I’d see what all this fuss was all about!” Sarge says, elbowing his way past Wash into their house. Tucker stares at him, holding up his datapad wordlessly to snap a photo as Sarge surveys the pole. “Huh. Haven’t seen one of these thingamabobs since m’Basic days!”

“Since…Basic,” Wash says, still a little dumbfounded as Sarge strips off his shirt and begins stretching.

“I knew it,” Tucker says from where he’s materialized at his shoulder, his tone resigned. “I always knew we’d have that foursome someday.”

Wash slaps a hand to his forehead, groaning, as Sarge straightens and observes them critically. “Son,” he says, his tone grave, “today ain’t the day. Emmy has got patients coming out the wazoo and she’d never forgive me if she missed out. ‘Sides, if we make Agent Frecklelancer blush any harder, think we might give him a heart attack on the spot, and then I don’t get m’pole lesson!”

“True,” says Tucker, snickering, “and _that’s_ not something I wanna miss out on.”

He settles himself back at the counter, pouring another cup of coffee and readying his datapad. “Go on, then,” Sarge says, nonplussed. “Post it all over Basebook!”

“Oh, don’t worry, I will.”

“Okay,” Wash says, folding his arms across his chest. “If this is some kind of joke, and you’re making fun of me—”

“Now, don’t get your undies all in a bunch because I said today wasn’t a good day for the foursome—”

“ _There’s not going to be a foursome!_ ” Wash snaps, rubbing at his temples. “You two really need to stop joking about that, alright, it’s been _five years_ ….”

He trails off as Sarge shrugs, hand-standing against the pole, something nagging at him. _It’s been five years._ “Why does Dr. Grey have a lot of patients today?”

Even as Sarge rights himself and gives Wash a look, he suddenly knows the answer. “Because! It’s the five-year anniversary since the war ended! My house has been full of crying kids all morning!”

In his peripheral, Tucker quietly puts his datapad down.

“I forgot,” Tucker says, stunned, looking at the calendar on their wall rather blankly. “He’s right. It has been five years.”

And as Wash stands there, glancing between the two of them—Tucker’s bank face, the angry slant of Sarge’s eyebrows, he remembers—

Remembers—

_Remembers the eerie silence of the ship as he moves down the hallways with Carolina at his side. They round a hallway, move, clear, the two of them not speaking, not needing to speak. They’re fine. They’re all dead. They’re fine. They’re all dead. The two extremes war in his head, and Wash shoves them both down, allows himself to become cold and calculating._

_The wave of destruction leading to the trophy room—_

_Carolina’s gasp at the shape of Maine’s old helmet—_

_Tucker, so still, and Wash can’t get his fucking helmet off—even as he watches, the suit appears to be melting, fusing at the ports, and Tucker is still inside of it and Wash doesn’t even know if he—if he—_

_Simmons standing across the room, helmet off, unaware of the blood pouring down his temple as he stares down at Grif’s motionless body—_

_Sarge, who is moving with grim, practiced movements—getting his Grif’s chestplate off, emergency medical kit out, attaches the defribulator to Grif’s chest—_

Wash looks at Sarge now, tries and fails not to think about standing in that hospital corridor after they’d gotten everyone out, at the way Sarge had chucked his helmet at the opposing wall and Wash had gone to retrieve it. “Sick to death of these corridors,” he’d grumbled by way of explanation, and Wash had understood. They’d all waited and paced and waited and slept and waited and cried or didn’t and waited for each other in far too many hospital corridors over the years, and it wasn’t fair that it was going to end like this, with Tucker and Grif both still unconscious, it wasn’t fair that they might not make it after all they’d been through—

But they had.

They’d made it, and they were here. They were right here.

Wash blinks, boxes up the memories, and puts them back where they belong. “So,” he says to Sarge, “ _you_ poled in Basic, too?”

“Well, we had to find something to do!” Sarge blusters, marching over to the pole. His eyes flick to Tucker, who is still staring off into space with a blank expression on his face. “Let’s see what I remember…”

Wash rolls his eyes as he climbs effortlessly to the top of the pole with just his arms. “Show off.”

“You ain’t seen nothing yet, blue!”

The afternoon deteriorates from there, but it ends in a dance-off that has Tucker on the floor howling with laughter and Sarge wiping tears of mirth from his own eyes. Five years float around them in the air like a ghost, but they don’t fight it or let them pull it down. They move with it, like dancers, like lovers.

They move on.

* * *

No matter how many years go by, Wash will never, ever get used to going grocery shopping.

Admittedly, this is usually Tucker’s task. He loves grocery shopping, the weirdo, and always manages to stretch the task out a three-hour event because “I ran into Kai in the soup aisle and you will not BELIEVE what she told me about Patil.” Tucker also goes because he loves to cook and knows exactly what to get, but sometimes if he can’t go, he’ll provide Wash a list that he follows with solemn attention to detail.

Wash will never get over the strangeness of it all, of the simple, mundane task of following the shopping list his lover wrote up, buying flour and chocolate chips, carrots and chicken. He’ll never grow used to seeing so many people out of armor—Carolina in a flowing skirt buying coffee grounds, Grif in his pajama bottoms, Donut and Doc making out in suits next to the eggs.

It’s normal. It’s a glorious kind of normal, and he doesn’t know if he’ll ever be able to make himself believe that the other shoe isn’t going to drop.

“Agent Washington!”

He turns at the delighted sound of his name and nearly falls over as Britton leaps into his arms. “It’s _Wash,_ Britton,” he tells her for the millionth time, giving her a gentle squeeze back and setting her on her feet.

She waves a hand, beaming up at him. “Oh, I know, but I can’t break the habit!”

He smiles at her fondly, something softening in his chest as it always does when he’s in the presence of the young cadets he used to train. He knows that Britton suffers from her own scars, the most visible being the gleaming silver prosthetic arm she wears, but her smile is genuine, the set of her shoulders relaxed, a wedding band gleaming on her finger. Twenty-one. She made it to twenty-one.

“Soooo,” she says slyly, “your little stunt in Sabine’s club is the talk of Chorus, you know.”

“I’ve heard…wait, were you there?”

“Of course I was there! I helped Sabine plan the opening!”

“But—oh, right, you’re twenty-one, I suppose you can drink.”

“Agent _Washington,_ ” she says, rolling her eyes, “there’s no drinking age on Chorus!”

“Right.” He gives his head a little shake. “Good point.”

She shifts her basket to the other arm, eyeing him. “I heard you’re giving private lessons!”

Jesus Christ. He really needs to stop telling Donut literally _anything_. “I’m not giving private lessons,” he says with a sigh. “I’ve just had a few people over who wanted to learn, that’s all.”

“Right, right,” she says, and—uh-oh. He knows that look. It’s the same look Britton used to wear just before she was about to ask him something she was nervous about, like if it was okay if she went on some dangerous mission even though she didn’t have her new arm yet or if she could leave training early to go watch _Grey’s Anatomy_ or what it was like to kiss someone (he still hasn’t recovered from that last one). “It’s just like….it’s _really cool,_ you know? I never even heard of pole dance until Sabine mentioned it and said she wanted poles in the club! It looks like you have to be crazy strong.”

“Not necessarily,” says Wash. “I mean, you build it up. Just like we used to build it up our strength in training.”

“Yeah,” says Britton, her face falling slightly. “Still, though…”

“Still what?”

She mutters something, eyes downcast at the floor, looking so forlorn so suddenly that Wash nearly panics. “What’s wrong?”

She takes a breath. “Guess you can’t learn with one arm though, can you?”

“Of course you can,” Wash says immediately. Can you? He doesn’t know. He doesn’t care. He will _find a way_ for Britton to do this if that’s what she wants.

Britton brightens at once. “Really?”

“Absolutely.”

“Oh! Oh—Agent Washington, will you show me? Please?”

“Yes, of course—”

“Can you show me _right now?_ ”

“I sure can.”

* * *

 

 Tucker only shakes his head when they walk in the door thirty minutes later. Britton practically skipping with excitement. Wash cajoles her into a warm-up, then they both stand staring at the pole with their hands on their hips. “Now, we might have to go through some trial and error,” Wash cautions, “so don’t get discouraged. Alright?”

“I won’t,” Britton says solemnly, and with that, they begin.

They quickly learn that gripping the pole directly with Britton’s prosthetic won’t work—the metal is too slippery. She takes this in stride, and they move right onto a series of one hand tricks. Britton is small and agile, and even manages the make it to the top of the pole after Wash shows her how to use the strength in her legs. The sight of her beaming face at the top of the pole and her subsequent victory dance with Tucker only strengthen his resolve. He’s _got_ to figure out a way for her to use that prosthetic.

And for that, he needs….

* * *

 

“I’m sorry, you need me to help you make what?”

“A glove to fit over a prosthetic,” Wash says awkwardly. “One that can grip metal.”

Simmons stares at him. “Specifically, the stainless steel of your…pole dancing pole.”

“Correct.”

Silence falls. Simmons scratches the back of his neck. “Uh, Wash, I don’t…really know how to…build things?”

“Yeah, but you’re…smart,” Wash says lamely. “Don’t you know what kind of polymers bond to metal or something?”

Simmons snickers, instantly superior. “That’s not what that means. A polymer—”

“Oh, my god,” Grif groans from where he’s stretched out on their living room couch. “Wash, I fucking hate you.”

“Simmons, can’t you try?” Wash asks, ignoring him. “If you could at least get me started…I could help with the building of it, I just don’t know where to begin.”

“So like, what’s with you and pole dancing anyway?” Grif calls.

Simmons raises his eyebrows at Wash expectantly, and Wash sighs. “I…don’t know. It seems like everyone wants to learn it. I’m sure that Britton is going to tell all of her friends and—”

“Wait,” Simmons interrupts, “this glove is for Britton? Bea Britton?”

“Yeah—”

“Grif, get up,” Simmons snaps.

“What?! Why?”

“I need you to come to the hardware store with me to get some materials for this glove.”

“Can’t you do that by yourself?”

“You know I don’t know where anything is in that place!”

With a monumental groan, Grif rolls off the couch, shoves his feet into sneakers, and snatches his car keys. “Get in, losers. We’re going shopping.”

* * *

 

It’s a rather pleasant day after that, and the they of them work long after it’s gone dark. Wash examines the glove they’ve made as the three of them sit around Grif and Simmons’ firepit, beers in hand. “You guys—I think this is going to be perfect.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Grif grumbles. He tosses another beer to Wash. “Seriously though. _What_ is the deal with you and this pole?”

Wash is silent for a moment, regarding the beer in one hand, the glove in the other. “It’s fun,” he says finally, looking up with a rueful little smile. “It’s just fun.”

“Fun?” Grif asks, as if he’s never heard the word before. “You’re doing something for fun, and nothing else?”

Wash thinks of how hard he and Kimball had laughed when they fell out of a doubles move together. Thinks of Sarge strutting around to old show-tunes during their dance-off. Thinks of Britton shrieking with pride when she nailed a move.

“Yeah,” Wash says. “I guess I am.”

* * *

Things sort of spiral after that. Britton’s glove is a smashing success and, as Wash suspected, she tells every single one of her friends about her new hobby. By the time the week is out, Wash has given no less than fifteen pole lessons. The students range from his closest friends to the guy on the security force he’s never gotten along with. Wash stares at the door after the latter has left, still a little stunned. “This is getting weird.”

“You’re telling me,” said Tucker. “I didn’t think that guy was capable of emotion, let alone tears.”

Wash shakes his head slowly. It had been a very, very weird week, and he didn’t know what to make of it. Which usually meant he needed….

* * *

“So. Um. I think I’m running some sort of…pole dancing therapy program.”

Dr. Grey clasps her hands together from where she’s seated across her desk, delighted. “Well, now, I’ve heard that your house has become quite the popular place as of late! Tell me about that.”

“I…” Wash rubs at the back of his neck, uncomfortable. He’s been seeing Dr. Grey off and on for five years now, but he sometimes still finds it difficult to talk about what’s on his mind. “I don’t know. Every since that night at the club, people have been asking me for lessons. Coming over and asking me to teach them some stuff.”

“And this bothers you?”

“Oh—no, not at all! That’s just the problem.”

Dr. Grey tilts her head. “The problem?”

“It’s…” Wash sighs, leaning forward and placing his elbows on her desk. “Okay, it’s like this. They come over, and I show them some stuff, and…sometimes—well, usually, actually….usually we…talk.”

“Talk?”

“About the war. Or sometimes not about the war. About what it was like before, or after. Sometimes there are…uh. Tears. It depends. But when they leave, they seem to feel….better.”

“And how do you feel?”

“Good,” Wash says honestly. “Really good. I don’t know how good I am at the listening part, but…I like teaching people. Helping the cadets when they were just kids in the war, helping the Reds and Blues realize their potential. I like it.”

She smiles at him gently. “I’m afraid I still don’t understand the problem.”

Wash is silent for a long time before meeting her gaze with a helpless shrug to his shoulders. He doesn’t know how to voice some of the ridiculous thoughts that have been running through his mind lately—how he’s been thinking about those pole sessions more and more, even at work. How he spent hours working with Simmons to fashion that glove for Britton. How proud he was of Kimball when she’d finally nailed her superman trick. How that grumpy guy from the security force had cried on the floor after his lesson and talked about how good it felt to do something that had nothing to do with the war. How Wash finds himself planning lessons constantly and wondering if Tucker would mind a second pole in the living room.

But, as always, he doesn’t have to say any of these things—because, as always, Dr. Grey knows just the right question to ask. “And how’s your job?”

“Ugh,” Wash groans, leaning back in the chair and throw an arm over his eyes. “It’s awful. I never thought it would be possible to get bored running security, but let me tell you…”

“I hate it,” he finishes ten minutes later. “I hate putting that gun on every day. It makes me feel like I can’t…move on.”

Dr. Grey watches him thoughtfully for a while. “Do you see how differently you described those two things? Teaching, and your job as head of security?”

“Yes,” Wash says blankly, staring at her. “And? They don’t have anything to do with each other.”

“They have everything to do with each other,” says Dr. Grey. “One makes you happy, and one makes you miserable.”

Wash snorts. “So I should quit my job in security and, what, open a pole fitness studio?”

Dr. Grey doesn’t laugh, and Wash’s grin fades. “You’re joking.”

“Why would I joke about that?”

“Because it’s ridiculous.”

“Why?”

“Because,” says Wash, frustrated. “Because it _is._ Because I’m good at shooting people, and if something happens, I need to be ready to act, so that I can protect everyone.”

“Wash…if something were to happen—which, I must point out, the likelihood of that happening is no longer nearly so high—do you really think it matters what your job is? You will always be ready to defend your own. But…you no longer have to prepare for that every minute of the day.”

“It’s—look, this is just what I do,” Wash says. He squares his shoulders, resigned. “This is what I’m suited for.”

“Violence?”

_“Yes.”_

“There’s more to you than that,” she says firmly. “I _know_ you know this by now.”

When Wash doesn’t answer, she leans forward. “Wash, you don’t have to keep working security because you think it’s all your good for. You can do what you _want_. And—you speak of being needed….maybe _this_ is the way you’re truly needed. That club that Sabine opened did far more for moral and instilling a sense of normalcy than anything else has so far in Armonia. Contributing to that normalcy, giving these people something fun…I can think of no better calling.”

He lifts an eyebrow. “Calling?”

“Or whatever you like,” she says, with that tinkling laugh he knows so well. “But Wash…think about it?”

“Okay,” says Wash. “Okay, yeah….yeah, I’ll think about it.”

* * *

He quits the security force the next day.

Tucker arrives home to find Wash staring at the pole in their living room, wide-eyed with panic. “What?” he says in alarm, dropping his keys on the floor and rushing over. “What? What happened?”

“I…” Wash shakes his head, momentarily unable to speak. He pulls it together when Tucker starts to look truly terrified. “I just quit my job.”

Whatever Tucker was expecting, it clearly wasn’t that. “Okay,” he says slowly, “why don’t you sit down—”

“I can’t sit down,” Wash says, still in that strangled little whisper. “I have to plan my _lessons._ ”

Tucker stares at him. “Wash, what are you—"

“I quit my job,” Wash moans, dropping his head against the cool metal of the pole, “so that I could open a pole-dancing studio.”

He’s never heard such a ringing silence. “I mean, not just pole dancing,” Wash says, speaking very quickly now. “I just thought….some sort of exercise studio. Something that’s more than just basic weight lifting. Anyway--Carolina used to do Zumba—shit, I probably wasn’t supposed to tell you that—well, anyway, maybe she’d like to teach a class once a week. And Sarge and Em do salsa together in their living room and they’re actually pretty good. And—you like to dance, right? Maybe you’d like to teach something. Or not! This is stupid! It’s the stupidest idea ever! Of all time! Why did I think that—”

“Wash.” It’s the little laugh in Tucker’s voice that makes Wash look up. “Dude, come sit down. You’re all freaked out.”

Wash lets Tucker lead him over to the couch, but shoots back up almost immediately. “I need to call Brennings—he’ll probably give me my job back if—”

“No!” Tucker yanks on his arm, pulling him back into a sit. “Don’t you fucking dare. It’s about time you quit that job.”

“Wait, what?” Wash stares at him. “You didn’t like my job?”

“ _You_ didn’t like your job,” Tucker corrects. “But, you know, every time I tried to talk to you about it, you got all weird.”

“Weird?”

“Weird,” Tucker confirms. “Wash, seriously. You hated picking up that gun every day.”

“I just…” Wash sighs. “I thought I had to. We worked so hard to stabilize this planet, and if something happens…”

Tucker rolls his eyes. “If something happens, you’ll be the first to suit up. Your job won’t mean jack shit.”

“That’s what Dr. Grey said.”

“Yeah, well, she’s right. You don’t gotta be on high alert all the time.” Tucker nudges him with his foot. “Go have fun. Go plan your lessons. There’s a building for rent two doors down from Sabine’s club. Maybe that could be your gym.”

“There is?”

“Yup.” Tucker stands and stretches, offering his hand to Wash. “Wanna go check it out?”

“I just thought…” Wash pauses. It seems important, somehow, to articulate this. “I thought people might like a spot to work out that doesn’t have a firing range in it. The only place right now is the old base and…people seem to like this, you know? They like that it doesn’t remind them of the war. And I…I like teaching them.”

“You always did enjoy bossing us around, so I can see that.” Tucker dodges the pillow Wash throws at him, laughing. “Kidding, dude. I’m on board. Let’s go check that place out.”

Wash hesitates for only a moment longer before taking Tucker’s hand and allowing him to pull him to his feet.

* * *

 

_Six months later…_

Sabine arches her eyebrow from across the bar table. “A recital?”

“A recital,” Wash confirms. He pulls out his datapad, beaming at a video he pulls up. “Look at this. BB choreographed the most beautiful routine—see, look there, look at all the strength she has on equal sides of her body now—oh, and I have to show you the move Falguni just nailed—”

“I don’t need to see every video on your datapad of your _kids_ , Washington,” says Sabine, rolling her eyes. “I already have to look at them all over Basebook, and Britton never shuts up about that place—”

“Fine, fine,” Wash says, regretfully dropping his datapad back onto the table. “The point is, everyone has been working so hard and I think it would be nice if they could show off a little.”

“Sure, sounds great. Why are you telling me this, exactly?”

Wash sighs. He can’t blame her confusion, knows exactly why she’s leaning back in her chair, arms folded defensively across her chest. They’d never been what you could call friends, but she’d been openly hostile towards him ever since her now-husband Ali had lost his arm trying to find Wash when he’d been taken captive in the war. Still. They both ran their own business now, businesses that had nothing to do with the war. They texted each other about power outages on their shared street and attended neighborhood meetings and put up flyers of each other’s establishments in their lobbies. Friends or not, they’d known each other for over five years. He liked Sabine, for her skill in battle, for her unapologetic loyalty to those she loved, for the way she’d gotten the whole street a new electrical system at the last council meeting.

He’d thought that maybe, one day…

 _“Because,_ ” says Wash, “your club and my studio are basically right next to each other. I thought we could come up with something together—maybe some kind of afterparty after the show at your club. Make a whole evening out of it.”

Sabine stares at him for a few seconds before leaning forward, her determinedly blank expression morphing into something more thoughtful. “Hmm. That’s actually not a bad idea.”

“We could do coupons or something,” Wash says, encouraged. “Give all the participants a free drink—nothing fancy—and have the audience members purchase a wristband that gives them discounts.”

“ _Reprise_ doesn’t have much more than bar food, but I could maybe have something catered,” Sabine muses, pulling up her own datapad now. “And of course, we’d have the afterparty there, leave all the poles open for the performers…maybe do a raffle…”

The minutes fly by as the two of them plan out the event. They make their way through another round of drinks and before Wash knows it, its been over an hour. He looks at their list, grinning. “I think this is gonna be great.”

“We’ve forgotten one thing.”

Wash frowns, eyes still on her datapad. “Hmm? What?”

“Advertising.”

“Well, we said we’d make a Basebook event—”

“I meant…” Sabine clears her throat, each word slow, measured, careful. “It would be nice to have some posters that we could hang around town. I could ask Ali, if he’d like to draw them up.”

They look at each other. The years linger in the air between them like stones, like bricks. “I think what you’re doing is…I think it’s good,” she says, awkward but sure. “You hated that job on the security force.”

Wash sputters. “Did _everyone_ know that?”

“Yes, Wash. Everyone knew that.”

They both grin, still a little uncertain. “I kept thinking about how you quit the job at the consulate to open your club. You were the first person to do something like that, you know.”

“I know,” she says, and the confidence is so Sabine that his grin only widens. “People deserve something good. Something that doesn’t remind them of the war everywhere they go. You know what I mean?”

He does.

“Ask Ali about the posters,” says Wash. “I just thought of something else.”

“What?”

“Well,” Wash says slowly, “remember how Grif ran that secret salon in the war?”

“Yeah…”

He leans forward conspiratorially. “I know he still cuts some people’s hair, but…what if we got him to agree to style everyone’s hair for their performances?”

Sabine laughs, bright like bells. “He’ll never agree to that.”

Wash offers her his hand. “What do you say we go convince him?”

She takes his hand and together, they rise.

**Author's Note:**

> I borrowed the glorious headcanon of tucker being named after his mother from my darling [comefeedtherainn](https://archiveofourown.org/users/comefeedtherainn/pseuds/comefeedtherainn), THANKS MY LOVE
> 
> and thank YOU for reading <3


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